lavatory
Americannoun
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lavatories
plural
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a room fitted with equipment for washing the hands and face and usually with flush toilet facilities.
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a flush toilet; water closet.
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a bowl or basin with running water for washing or bathing purposes; washbowl.
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any place where washing is done.
noun
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Also called: toilet, water closet, WC.
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a sanitary installation for receiving and disposing of urine and faeces, consisting of a bowl fitted with a water-flushing device and connected to a drain
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a room containing such an installation
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the washing place in a convent or monastic establishment
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of lavatory
1325–75; Middle English lavatorie < Late Latin lavātōrium washing-place, equivalent to Latin lavā ( re ) to wash + -tōrium -tory 2
Explanation
A lavatory is a bathroom or a restroom. You should go to a restaurant's lavatory to wash your hands before dinner. Lavatory is a slightly formal way to say "bathroom." Most people would never refer to this room in their own homes as a lavatory, although they might use this word for public restrooms in schools, hospitals, or other buildings. In the U.K., a lavatory is just a toilet, and its earliest meaning was "washbasin," from the Latin root lavatorium, or "place for washing."
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Respectfully: the only thing I want to do at 3:33 a.m. is use the lavatory or kick the cat out of the bedroom.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026
But the lavatory issues proved to just be a small inconvenience as the crew made history, travelling further from Earth than any other human had done before.
From BBC ● Apr. 10, 2026
One of the residents admitted to breaking the lavatory bowl in October 2023.
From BBC ● Nov. 22, 2025
Lambton, a photographer, traveled all over Britain to bring us this visual history of the lavatory.
From New York Times ● Nov. 23, 2024
The boy leaned against a lavatory and began drawing on the back of his hands with a ballpoint pen.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
The facility hosts 85 beds with the capacity to expand to 100 and includes a mix of dormitories, lavatories, a kitchen and laundry facilities.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 1, 2026
He urges athletes to choose window seats in the middle of the aircraft, away from the most-trafficked areas—the front, where everyone enters, and the rear, near the galley and the lavatories.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2025
BBC Scotland News understands that the Scottish government is confident that the vast majority of schools in Scotland already offer single-sex lavatories.
From BBC ● Apr. 23, 2025
In Renton, Boeing mechanics and quality inspectors complete the cabin interior, adding the wiring, insulation and sidewalls that would cover the plug before adding the seats, galley, lavatories and other interior elements.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 6, 2024
There at the lavatories was the same boy that Patrolman Mancuso had been seeing every day, it seemed.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
